Travel Tip: Art and Archaeology in United StatesScenes from the Stone Age: The Cave Paintings of Lascaux.

Scenes from the Stone Age: The Cave Paintings of Lascaux. UNITED STATESCHICAGO • The Field Museum • Ongoing

The cave paintings of Lascaux (Lass-KOH) are the world’s premier example of prehistoric art. Discovered in 1940 in southwest France, these masterpieces were made by our early ancestors almost 20,000 years ago. French officials closed the cave in 1963 to preserve the paintings but now, thanks to the latest digital technology, the cave has been painstakingly re-created with full-sized replicas of the artworks including some shown for the first time to the public.

Exhibition visitors will experience the thrill of walking through the cave and discovering beautiful, ancient artworks lit by simulated torch light. Along the way, they will encounter a lifelike stone-age family – an old man, an adolescent, a woman, and a child – created by sculptor Elisabeth Daynès. The exhibition also features rare stone-age artifacts from the Museum’s collections. Videos and interactives explain how Paleolithic people lived and how the cave paintings were made, but the purpose of the paintings remains a tantalizing mystery. The Field Museum is the first North American venue for this exhibition.